Showing 1 - 10 of 26
Somaliland: Mixed motivations
News, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 03/01/2026
» Last week Israel was the first country in the world to establish diplomatic relations with Somaliland. Not Somalia, a wreck of a country on the East African coast that has been mired in civil war for the past thirty-five years, but Somaliland, a different country just north of there that has been peaceful, relatively prosperous and even democratic for all those years.
Kingdom of Denmark vs the Shadow Fleet
News, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 25/10/2025
» Back in the 16th and 17th centuries, two-thirds of the Danish kingdom's income came from taxes paid by every ship passing through the Øresund ('The Sound') Strait, the only exit from the Baltic Sea. Each ship had to declare its cargo -- and if the Danes thought they were undervaluing it, Denmark had the right to buy it at the declared price.
Symbolic acts won't create a real Palestine
Oped, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 25/09/2025
» Ten more countries are recognising Palestine as a sovereign state in the course of this week. That brings the total up from 147 to 157. It's a big deal to an extent because for the first time it includes quite a few big, rich Western countries (France, the UK, Canada and Australia). But it is not unified, and it still controls no territory.
Farewell Nato: The late, great military alliance
Oped, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 05/03/2025
» The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (Nato) retired to its sickbed as soon as Donald Trump won the presidential election last November. It finally died last Friday in the White House, when Mr Trump and Vice-President JD Vance launched a vicious attack on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky before the massed cameras of the American media.
War: two steps forward, two steps back?
Oped, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 13/02/2025
» In classical civilisations, there was a continuing, unresolved debate about whether history moved forward or just went around in circles: was it linear or was it cyclical? But that debate was largely settled once human beings learned about their deeper past. It's linear.
Francis not the liberal Pope the world is keen for
News, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 04/09/2023
» Javier Milei, who is very likely to be elected president of Argentina in the October election, is fairly frank in his view of Pope Francis, a fellow Argentine. He calls Pope Francis "a Communist turd" and "the representative of the Evil One on Earth". Even for a ranter like Mr Milei, who ranks very high on the Trump scale of invective, that's rare praise.
Sahel coups are just another 'Great Game'
Oped, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 01/08/2023
» If you are a democratically elected leader in one of Africa's Sahel countries -- let's say, Niger -- and you suspect that the army is plotting to overthrow you, what's the best countermeasure? Should you:
Putin provides a shot in the arm for Nato
Oped, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 12/07/2023
» When Nato held its annual summit in Brussels two years ago, all 31 presidents and prime ministers of the alliance’s member states dutifully showed up, but their hearts weren’t really in it. France’s President Emmanuel Macron had publicly declared Nato “brain-dead” in 2019, and nobody could find a good reason to disagree.
Have we passed the point of no return with AI?
Oped, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 01/06/2023
» 'Sometimes I think it's as if aliens have landed and people haven't realised because they speak very good English," said Geoffrey Hinton, the 'godfather of AI' (Artificial Intelligence), who resigned from Google and now fears his godchildren will become "things more intelligent than us, taking control".
Ukrainian steel puts frighteners on US top brass
Oped, Gwynne Dyer, Published on 21/06/2022
» How would we know if the United States is deliberately starving Ukraine of weapons in order to force it into a compromise peace settlement that leaves some Ukrainian territory -- maybe even a lot -- in Russian hands?